Not selling the streaming right marks a big change in FOM's approach. Bernie used to outsource streaming to the broadcasters in exchange for a big pile of money. Liberty want to do it themselves, and therefore compete with the broadcasters. The price of the TV rights is about to go down. I wonder how that will affect FOM's income in the future, and teams' prize money...

Well that pretty much ENDS F1 in the US. If you want to completely screw up race broadcasts, let the guys as Disney pick the commentary team. They make the NBC Nascar team seem electrifying and great. Combine that with ESPN's idea of paying nothing for new commentators and now firing them before they become stars, and we get ZERO chance they will think NBCSN and Speed had a great thing with Hobbs/Matchett. I'm guessing we'll end up with Eddie Cheever, Scott Speed, or some other ex-F1 US driver and the high point of likely bringing Buxton across for trackside access and interviews if he is willing to take their probably terrible pay. Not sure who they'd try to sign as play-by-play since they need to replace Bestwick after firing him after Indy 500. Was really hoping this meant they had lost the 500 and their few Indy races but sounds like we're stuck with them again for a few races more. Just go to the Indy side of the forum to hear how bad the coverage really is, even the series writers can't find anything good, or even neutral, to say above it other than it has to end soon.

This will be a dumpster fire for Liberty as many things they've touched have turned into lately, see Braves 2015-2017 without signs of actual improvement despite the cash influx from dragging the team out of town to a strip mall they call a stadium. Improving the wrapper just hides the pet waste inside and I think that's their idea of improvement. Don't view the actual product, how do people perceive it TODAY and calculate value this second. Late season numbers show fans really didn't care about the Battery when the team is bad. But their radio station runs non-stop ads and in-programming faked commentator testimonial about how great it is as a fan experience. And given that ESPN charges between 9 and 18 dollars per month per subscriber to full service cable, going with the number one reason people cut the cord is a bad idea. ESPN constantly fights 'a la carte' cable programming because they know they are a money pit after overbidding for college sports, NBA and NFL games. Can get NBCSN, and FS1/2, with an a la carte digital provider but ESPN increases costs and decreases access so guess I'm back to zero F1 coverage again.

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It was fun while it lasted, have enjoyed the people I've met but the measuring contests and arguments over who's more insider and who's smarter has just made it not worth the effort any longer. It should be fun, not work and it's just work to find actual information.

This makes ZERO sense to me. There is no way FOM just lets ESPN broadcast without paying a fee. It is my understanding that ALL broadcasters use the world feed content (produced by FOM's broadcast arm). Then they can add whatever extra (such as commentary by their own team) to craft their own broadcast. Additionally, per posts in the UK F1 broadcast thread, it seems that FOM also owns the rights to those customized broadcasts as well. So for example FOM owns the rights to the NBC content that is created today and would be the same for the ESPN content in the future. I assume that is done for many reasons. But mostly to protect the IP that FOM has given it is derivative work of licensed content.

given Steve Bratches' long time tenure and relationship (one of the architects of building a pay TV sports model) with ESPN i cant say this isnt surprising plus i would think there has to much more to this deal then what has so far been reported.

the no money thing is certainly unusual and i wonder what the quid pro quo will be...just speculating but i could see ESPN offering FOM a pay wall online streaming platform with a global reach and/or a production department to help monetize the F1 archive of historical footage (more documentaries, features, and movies etc).

for sure, at some point there will be an additional cost to the fans but if the quality of content is there then i think it could be a good thing.

commentary crew aside (will wait to see who they get), i also do like the idea of a few races being on ABC's Wide World of Sports...i think Al Michaels used to do some of the commentary.

one of the first F1 races i ever saw was a mid 80's Monaco GP on the Wide World of Sports program so some nostalgia for me there.

Last edited by chillibowl; 11 Oct 2017 at 19:28.

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What shall we use to fill the empty spaces, where waves of hunger roar?
Shall we set out across the sea of faces in search of more and more applause?
Shall we buy a new guitar? Shall we drive a more powerful car?

given Steve Bratches' long time tenure and relationship (one of the architects of building a pay TV sports model) with ESPN i cant say this isnt surprising plus i would think there has to much more to this deal then what has so far been reported.

the no money thing is certainly unusual and i wonder what the quid pro quo will be...just speculating but i could see ESPN offering FOM a pay wall online streaming platform with a global reach and/or a production department to help monetize the F1 archive of historical footage (more documentaries, features, and movies etc).

for sure, at some point there will be an additional cost to the fans but if the quality of content is there then i think it could be a good thing.

commentary crew aside (will wait to see who they get), i also do like the idea of a few races being on ABC's Wide World of Sports...i think Al Michaels used to do some of the commentary.

one of the first F1 races i ever saw was a mid 80's Monaco GP on the Wide World of Sports program so some nostalgia for me there.

The big selling point if Liberty really wants to move to or push a streaming platform is the success and variety ESPN has been able to offer on ESPN3, the streaming platform not the occasional channel name. The big problem currently with that is ESPN is facing a few FCC and class action cases regarding the net neutrality violation of forcing all who pay for internet access affiliated with ESPN3 to pay for it. It is not a line item on your ISP bill and I believe AT&T fiber, and a few other services that require an internet and tv combo offering have an ESPN access path. But you can also get ESPN3 at many US colleges and universities by accessing through your school email account. It is also on XBox Live with Gold now and I believe Dish has made it available as a solo purchase add-on with SlingTV. But many of the offerings have been of the secondary college sports, Canadian football and obscure events. Believe they had signed WC qualifiers in the past and other events. But it is a large multi-channel platform that NSCSN just seemingly couldn't offer. Their app is TERRIBLE and they've spent a LOT of their money pushing a second channel of purely Olympic coverage, 24/7, 365. Nothing like watching previous Olympic events cause everyone loves tape delayed events we only care about every 4 years.

Sadly ABC's wide world of sports declined after Keith Jackson stopped and went out to pasture after Al Michaels stopped caring. That old theme music and Keith's intro still can bring chills and used to be the only way to see LM24 highlights and a few GPs. ABC still uses the tagline and basic idea, but it's not even close to the same thing anymore.

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It was fun while it lasted, have enjoyed the people I've met but the measuring contests and arguments over who's more insider and who's smarter has just made it not worth the effort any longer. It should be fun, not work and it's just work to find actual information.

The big problem currently with that is ESPN is facing a few FCC and class action cases regarding the net neutrality violation of forcing all who pay for internet access affiliated with ESPN3 to pay for it.

It is not a line item on your ISP bill and I believe AT&T fiber, and a few other services that require an internet and tv combo offering have an ESPN access path.

But [...] is also on XBox Live with Gold now and I believe Dish has made it available as a solo purchase add-on with SlingTV.

ESPN3 should be purchased independently from internet access, of course. But the FCC didn't stop ESPN during the Obama government, and the new FCC president is even more lobby-friendly.

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"Show me a driver who didnít make a handful of errors this year, and Iíll show you someone who wasnít trying hard enough." - David Malsher

Zak Brown was talking with the NBCSN crew during FP2 and said he was going to miss the guys next year, to which they said they would miss it too. I guess this is a strong indication that the move to ESPN is going to result in worse coverage. I was holding out hope they would shift the same coverage over to ESPN. This will likely be the first move by Liberty Media that I will not like, and it may be the most important, as any major change in availability of FP2, Qualifying, or the race, or shifting to online only for any of those, will reduce my viewership. And the use of the Indy crew from ESPN/ABC will either require I get my audio elsewhere or I may just not watch FP2 or qualifying.

ESPN didn't really like to take other crews before, and now in the era of budget cuts and elimination of the sportscaster/anchor as a draw, I'd have been surprised to see them take anyone other than Will Buxton. Add even then signing him as a pure grab for some trackside interviews. How much racing does the various ESPN bits do worldwide? I'll admit I know nothing about ESPN outside of the US and was actually surprised anyone else would have wanted the "world-side leader" as they love to tag themselves.

As for FP sessions and even qualy, I expect those in the fall to magically disappear from broadcast on fall Saturdays. Maybe if they are early enough to miss the 14 hours of pregame coverage for college football but I couldn't imagine they would boot Big 10 noon games to ESPN2 for qualifying sessions. And to boot Sportscenter on a Sat or Sunday morning to ESPN2 or News to cover an 8 am US Eastern time?? Most of the season avoids that it's not like ESPN has had a great run of success the last decade, at least NBCSN has tried.

Hopefully this means they have ripped the 500 from ABC's terrible coverage finally. There is supposedly a TV announcement coming soon from Indy so who knows.

Personally hoping FOM/FIA agree to marketing a tape delayed on-demand streaming service on their own or Netflix/Amazon distributed. I rarely watched the races live as it is so waiting until Monday evening or later is fine by me.

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It was fun while it lasted, have enjoyed the people I've met but the measuring contests and arguments over who's more insider and who's smarter has just made it not worth the effort any longer. It should be fun, not work and it's just work to find actual information.

Is the Disney side viewed as an opportunity to put F1 in front of new eyeballs? Yes. Outside of sports, and whether that's through ABC or potential Disney opportunities with our theme parks, or cruise lines, or movie studios ... none of this has been determined or completely fleshed out at this point, but the opportunity is to integrate Formula 1 across the variety of assets that the Disney operates is pretty spectacular.

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"Show me a driver who didnít make a handful of errors this year, and Iíll show you someone who wasnít trying hard enough." - David Malsher

Even worse news about how Liberty chose ESPN for the US coverage rights. From Robin Miller on racer.com:

Q: Robin, I cannot believe that F1 is dropping NBCSN for ESPN! Are they NUTS? I remember when ESPN had covered FORMULA 1 and it sucked big time with races being shown at 2:30 in the morning! Horrible coverage! Thank God the SPEED Channel came along and saved us from ESPN's coverage. Then some moron decided to get rid of the SPEED Channel all together! NBCSN has done a great job covering FORMULA ONE and should continue doing so. I was sooooo disappointed when I read about the coverage change.
Dennis Studer
RM: The easiest explanation is that F1 gave it to ESPN (no production or talent costs and no rights fee) because I think the long-range plan is to make F1 all streaming on ESPN's app.

Hope that's Robin just spouting his thoughts but he's been on target lately with most things motorsports lately.

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It was fun while it lasted, have enjoyed the people I've met but the measuring contests and arguments over who's more insider and who's smarter has just made it not worth the effort any longer. It should be fun, not work and it's just work to find actual information.

That's gross. It's entirely likely though. Because of life and the odd hours of f1, I rely on recordings to watch later. When doing this with other series (IMSA), it means being days later when they upload it. I'm not sure, but I don't remember espn3 having a list of shows uploaded from previous broadcasts. Which leads to having to pay to join some f1 website to pay for the streams. Which means I won't be watching much f1 in the future.

I guess the temp circuit race through Disney world broadcast live on ABC will be the one race a year I'll be able to watch....

with the talk of Netflix/streaming in another thread i was reminded of a article a read a couple of months back about Disney severing their ties with Netflix and their plan to start their own streaming service which will have both Disney content plus a whole host of other sports ESPN currently has the distribution rights to.

not sure why i didnt put it together before but i wonder if F1 (in the USA and possibly Canada) will now be a part of this offering.

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What shall we use to fill the empty spaces, where waves of hunger roar?
Shall we set out across the sea of faces in search of more and more applause?
Shall we buy a new guitar? Shall we drive a more powerful car?

with the talk of Netflix/streaming in another thread i was reminded of a article a read a couple of months back about Disney severing their ties with Netflix and their plan to start their own streaming service which will have both Disney content plus a whole host of other sports ESPN currently has the distribution rights to.

not sure why i didnt put it together before but i wonder if F1 (in the USA and possibly Canada) will now be a part of this offering.

The more I read the more it looks like Liberty isn't even interested in cable in the future. They have made multiple claims of F1 becoming a streaming only 'broadcast' for the US market. How they handle it is huge because we've seen how PWC has choked in that regard with Motors on Demand TV. ALMS wasn't too bad with ESPN3 coverage, immediate availability was nice for me but for the majority who didn't get or know about ESPN3, it may not have been a great choice. And we are years later and many streaming options are out there.

Course all of this could be for naught if the wise old sages at the FCC tell us what we really need is a wide open and regulation free internet. You'll have to choose where you live based on who provides ESPN streaming if you want to watch without buffering or paying extra for the fast lane. And Comcast won't like having to stream ESPN and the cost of their precious NBCSN.

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It was fun while it lasted, have enjoyed the people I've met but the measuring contests and arguments over who's more insider and who's smarter has just made it not worth the effort any longer. It should be fun, not work and it's just work to find actual information.

Course all of this could be for naught if the wise old sages at the FCC tell us what we really need is a wide open and regulation free internet. You'll have to choose where you live based on who provides ESPN streaming if you want to watch without buffering or paying extra for the fast lane. And Comcast won't like having to stream ESPN and the cost of their precious NBCSN.

true true...all of this is playing out while the net neutrality debate is happening.

interesting (and more costly) times ahead!

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What shall we use to fill the empty spaces, where waves of hunger roar?
Shall we set out across the sea of faces in search of more and more applause?
Shall we buy a new guitar? Shall we drive a more powerful car?

no doubt SKY's F1 rights have little to nothing to do with the merger (so many other more valuable properties involved) but by way of this deal going through it looks like Disney/ESPN will soon be one step closer to locking up the broadcasting rights to F1.

one wonders how much of this Liberty knew in advance...prior to coming in for Liberty to run F1, Chase Carey was a top executive with 21st Century FOX and Sean Bratches was a long time exec at ESPN.

time will tell if less subscriber choice will be a boon or not for F1 fans.

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What shall we use to fill the empty spaces, where waves of hunger roar?
Shall we set out across the sea of faces in search of more and more applause?
Shall we buy a new guitar? Shall we drive a more powerful car?